


Cornerstone

by antagonists



Category: Gintama
Genre: Alternate Universe - Historical, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-19
Updated: 2016-11-19
Packaged: 2018-08-31 22:57:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,592
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8597056
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/antagonists/pseuds/antagonists
Summary: On nights when his dreams are plagued with foul memories, when the crow’s wings span the entire sky, the priest will sit by Gintoki and remain silent to the pain. A kiss to the crown of his head, fingers through his hair. He cannot help but want to keep these moments of half-anguish and half-tranquil, press them close to his chest to overwhelm the last echoes of bloodshed.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Eddaic](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eddaic/gifts).



> sorry for the wait and i hope u enjoy!!

*

 

 

He passes into the mountains around autumn.

 

Misty rains fill the valleys, and white collapses into delicate piles atop snowy peaks. In the distance, from both near and far, the temple bells toll. Brass cries shudder in the air like the low call of black birds. Gintoki follows the noise.

 

Perhaps there will be a roof to stay under somewhere. If not, he’ll continue his aimless trek through the shrouded land until he does.

 

It is not raining very hard when Gintoki stops upon the pathway to a shrine, but the skies are no less gloomy. The gray stone is slippery and treacherous with numerous puddles he can’t see so well. Mindlessly, he toes the mud off the path with his soaked sandals and watches the earth clump uselessly beneath his feet. The thunder is distant, at least, though he thinks that the noise might be a nice way to distract himself.

 

“Are you lost, traveler?”

 

Gintoki turns his head to see a priest in humble robes, arm outstretched. He’s holding out another wax-paper umbrella, but Gintoki has gotten used to wearing a simple straw hat during storms for so long that the small act of kindness is strange. Shaking his head, Gintoki stays his ground. The priest doesn’t seem too bothered that his offer has been rejected.

 

“Do I seem lost?” Gintoki asks, leaning against the nearby stone lantern. Unlit, cold. More water soaks into his clothes, but he hadn’t expected to emerge dry from this weather, anyways.

 

“That seems to be the case for many people who pass through here. It’s not quite a main trading route, you see.”

 

“Well, I’m not lost,” he says, even though he feels like he might be. “But I won’t turn down a place to stay for a little while.”

 

The priest tilts his chin downwards, a small bow. He turns to silently lead the way down the old path, and Gintoki watches his long hair sway and finds it unusual; most of the priests he’s encountered have shaved their heads, or at least keep it very trim. Had the priest’s robes been white and red, he could’ve passed for a miko. Pretty enough for one, at least, but Gintoki thinks that there’s probably something less soft, something untouchable about the priest's broad back.

 

They walk. Gintoki keeps his distance, one hand on his sword, eyes fixed on what he can see of the priest’s back. The umbrella is a deep shade of blue, almost black at the edges where the water has begun to soak in.

 

He concentrates on the sound of geta over the stone, sharp clicks that remind him of the pendulums from foreign lands. The rain falls harder, colder, and Gintoki relishes the chill that slinks into his bones to make a home out of them. To him, the cold is more comforting than the unbearable heat from funeral pyres—the ones that reach into the heavens and spew enough dark, fetid smoke to give the appearance of a hellish portal.

 

He does not realize that they have come to stop until long after the priest has turned around, concerned. Gintoki glances at the torii before him, the ribbons of white tied around towering rocks. A large tsurigane sits on the left, a purification fountain on the right.

 

“You must be tired,” the priest tells him, turning around again to walk further into the temple grounds. He dips a gourd into the fountain and washes his hands, cleanses his mouth.

 

“Not really,” Gintoki says, but follows anyways.

 

 

*

 

 

Katsura catches him sharpening his blade by the nearby river, once. He seems a bit alarmed, maybe even a little bit disappointed. It’s mostly hard to tell; Gintoki’s still not quite used to reading expressions outside of battle desperation.

 

“Are you planning on departing so soon?” Katsura asks, setting down a plate of onigiri by Gintoki’s side. The weather has cleared, leaving the skies brighter than the autumn foliage. “I can prepare a few days’ worth of food if that is the case.”

 

“Just sharpening,” Gintoki says, and it sounds lame even to his own ears. Though it has only been a few days, he already feels antsy; staying in one place for so long has never boded well for him. “Just to be safe.”

 

He knows what Katsura will say—that the temple is safe from the remnants of war, that Gintoki won’t need to hold another sword again if doesn’t want to. That if he chooses, he could start another life here.

 

But battle is all he’s known, really.

 

And Gintoki has seen other shrines and temples: charred, broken wood, mere husks consumed by fires meant to burn the dead (or the traitors). Some of those that had been intact when he first passed by were no longer untouched when he returned a few months later.

  
“If you feel the need to stand guard at night,” Katsura suggests, since he’s woken to the sound of Gintoki pacing outside numerous times already, “feel free. There are only spirits here, however, and I fear your sword is not enough to cut them.”

 

“Spirits,” Gintoki repeats, apprehensive. He finishes sharpening and sheathes his sword, tucks away the small whetstone into his sleeve. He’s never really liked ghost stories, since he would often dream of demons during the war.

 

Yet another reason he can’t sleep well at night. Too many memories of one-eyed monsters and loud-mouthed gremlins.

 

“Some are malicious ghosts, but those of us here are trained to purify them when necessary, so there is nothing to worry about.” The priest gives a small smile, “I understand that samurai never leave their debts unpaid, so you may function as a guard while we work, since we tend to be very vulnerable when in-between worlds.”

 

Gintoki rubs at his neck and sighs. He knows that this isn’t truly a request for payment, but more to give him something to take his mind off of whatever lies behind him. “Are you really a priest? This is the first time I’ve had one actually ask for repayment.”

 

“Do I seem so unlike a priest?”

 

Katsura’s eyes twinkle with amusement. They look like the glimpses of rich amber stolen from a merchant’s cart, deep wells of knowledge. He reaches over to pat Gintoki on the wrist, and the touch is not quite as soft as expected.

 

He grabs at Katsura’s hand, turns it this way and that. Neatly trimmed fingernails, long fingers, a broad palm that might’ve once held some sort of sword. Warm. No scars, though. Gintoki finds himself somewhat envious.

 

Calluses from archery, then. Those are different from what Gintoki is accustomed too, but familiar nonetheless. He’d had an archer friend during the war. They’d been beheaded during a retreat, unable to flee properly with a wounded leg. If he closes his eyes, he can visualize the details of his comrade’s long, disheveled hair, dark eyes dull and unseeing. Their throat a thick line of vicious red, lifted up to the skies as a trophy. Unpleasant.

 

“Maybe,” he finally says, letting go of the priest’s hand. He reaches for the onigiri and stares at the glistening white. “Whenever you have something for me to do, just call me.”

 

 

*

 

 

Perhaps a week later, Katsura wakes him in the early hours of the morning, hair unbound. Gintoki realizes that he is breathing heavily, sticky with cold sweat. Flashes of blood and bright armor, echoes of steel and the rush of feet over fallen bodies. There’s a hand steadying his shoulder, one pressed to his forehead. Gintoki stares frantically into the priest’s eyes and takes in deep breaths.

 

“War must have been especially unkind to you,” Katsura says quietly once the nightmare fit has passed, offering a cup of fragrant tea. He opens the shoji at Gintoki’s behest.

 

“Unkind to everyone,” he mutters, glaring at a small leak in the roof thatching. He sips at the tea quickly, ignoring the scalding heat. He glances at Katsura, who seems to be staring at something past the open shoji. The wind rustles through sparse leaves, sounding like the clatter of ema and the rustle of untied omikuji. “Is there something out there?”

 

“You have a spirit following you,” Katsura says, turning his gaze back down to the tatami. He must be cold in his simple nightwear, half-exposed to the chilly wind, but he does not complain. “Though I am sure you were already aware of that.”

 

“If you’re talking about the crow, it’s always been there.”

 

“I could exorcise it if you wanted.”

 

Gintoki sits up so fast the tea sloshes onto his hand. He pays no mind to the burn. “No.”

 

It wanes and waxes just like the moon—a constant reminder of Gintoki’s less peaceful days, but he cannot imagine a life fully free of those memories. It must be terrifyingly large tonight, if his dreams are any indication; the spirit has always fed off of negative energy. When he’d been a child scavenging for food in the aftermath of battles, he remembers seeing a stark, looming shadow overhead, like a winged black angel. Every time he’d watched yet another monstrous pyre spew ember into the sky, it had been there, eagerly watching. Beady-eyed. Ravenous.

 

Katsura frowns.

 

“I know,” Gintoki says defensively, “I know what you’re going to say, but I don’t want that.”

 

“It is in my best interests to help you,” the priest insists.

 

“I don’t need your help,” he snaps.

 

“Gintoki,” the priest says sadly.

 

They sit in broody silence for what seems like hours. Gintoki stares at the leaves at the bottom of his teacup, then at the green of the tatami. The sky begins lightening, overturning the dull blue into golden sunrise, smoothing warm colors into day. Katsura excuses himself to prepare for his morning duties, rising from seiza and leaving Gintoki to fester in his own thoughts.

 

After a few more moments of wallowing, Gintoki snorts in self-disgust and dresses himself properly. He walks past the torii and through the trees that grow more barren with every day, sword in hand, whetstone in the other. His straw sandals are on the verge of falling apart, but he can’t be bothered with making himself a new pair. By the time he gets back, he expects his hands and feet to be swollen from the cold.

 

The sword doesn’t need any more sharpening, and it’s no good to whet it repeatedly when the blade isn’t in constant use. Gintoki can’t help but feel like there’s something out there he’ll need to cut open, though, aside from the spirit he knows has been cursing him since he was a child.

 

There is a plate of onigiri and a flask of water set aside in the guest quarters when Gintoki returns. He opens the wrapped leaf to find a stick of dango as well, and he can do nothing but stare at the food for a good minute or so before he actually starts to eat. It’s strange to have a roof over his head along with such a steady supply of food; it’s probably impossible to feel _too_ comfortable, but the unease of regular comfort still sits heavily over his shoulders.

 

Gintoki prowls through the temple quietly, avoiding the other priests who know little of his presence or nothing at all, searching for Katsura and his serene prayer. He finds the young priest praying at a small altar, hands pressed together as the incense fills the small room. Even simply watching Katsura’s still form and long lashes, he feels like an intruder. Only once the stick of incense has completely shriveled to ash does the priest open his eyes. If he is surprised to see Gintoki there, observing him, he does not show it.

 

“Was the meal not adequate?” he asks. “I can make more if you require it.”

 

“No, not at all,” Gintoki says, feeling foolish and somewhat embarrassed. “I was just… standing guard.”

 

Katsura smiles gently and stands. He eyes the sad excuse for shoes outside the doors, then at the dry, cracked skin of Gintoki’s hands. “We’ve received donations of straw from a villager; I’ll help you make some new sandals.”

 

When he passes by Gintoki, it smells of sweet smoke.

 

 

*

 

 

Whether it’s by habit or by whim, Gintoki finds himself standing by the entryway of the prayer room more often. On some days, he’s careless and ends up being seen by some villager coming to pray or by another priest.

 

The encounters go badly, most of the time. He has the hair of a ghost, after all, and those who wield swords in time of tense peace are probably not looked upon too kindly. Katsura eventually takes the sword away and hides it somewhere, gives Gintoki better clothes that aren’t so threadbare and rough. Treats him as a person rather than a fighting pawn.

 

“I need those,” Gintoki says when Katsura says he’s off to burn the old clothes. He’s not exactly fond of them, but he’s unaccustomed to wearing clean clothes of nice quality. The best he’s ever had had barely been enough to hold together during battle. He’s no good at using thread and needle, but he can scrape by when it comes to tears from blade and holes from arrows.

 

“You’re scaring the villagers who come to pray,” the priest says chidingly, ignoring Gintoki’s small protest when he strikes the flint. “Some have thought you were a beggar, others believed they were seeing a demon.”

 

“But I’m not either.”

 

“Indeed,” Katsura agrees. “You are but a lost traveler.”

 

Winter’s hold over the mountains is loosening. It’s not exactly warm outside, but Gintoki can at least walk for a few hours without freezing into a statue. Katsura often holds his hands after he comes back, frowning at how cold Gintoki’s fingers are. Gintoki doesn’t try to pull away. It has been a long time since he’s felt the warmth in the touch of another person; the dead are either colder than stone, or are feverish with fire. Blood is not a welcome warmth.

 

There are times where he will hold fast onto Katsura’s hand, afraid to let go. On nights when his dreams are plagued with foul memories, when the crow’s wings span the entire sky, the priest will sit by Gintoki and remain silent to the pain. A kiss to the crown of his head, fingers through his hair. He cannot help but want to keep these moments of half-anguish and half-tranquil, press them close to his chest to overwhelm the last echoes of bloodshed.

 

The temple bell tolls, marking the hour of the rising sun.

 

Gintoki watches Katsura get dressed, pulling pale sleeves over his skin, tying his hair back into something more suitable of a priest. He himself stays within the confines of his blankets, unwilling to face the late-winter morning chill.

 

“Will you ever give me my sword back?” he asks.

 

The priest turns to face him while tying his obi, eyes glinting sharply in the low light. “As long as you remain at this temple, the sword will be under my possession.”

 

“But you don’t need it,” Gintoki says.

 

“As long as you are here,” Katsura repeats, smoothing out the creases in his robes, “I can offer you all the protection you need. Perhaps not in the world outside of here, however, so I will return your sword should you choose to leave.”

 

“…Geez,” Gintoki grumbles, burying himself deeper into the blankets. Katsura laughs softly as he exits, leaving the sunrise to warm Gintoki’s back.

 

 

*

 

 


End file.
